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Responsible gun ownership can save lives

The recent Las Vegas shooting brought gun issues back into the public eye.

Mass shootings have that effect on people, especially anti-gun factions. They focus on the current pixel instead of the big picture.

Mass shootings and single-victim murders raise the questions of what is responsible gun ownership and, for some, does it even exist?

At one extreme are the folks that think no one should own any gun, which negates even the possibility of responsible gun ownership. At the other are people who think no restriction is a good restriction on gun ownership, which makes owning a bump stock for an AR-15 that creates nearly full automatic firing legal.

Responsible gun ownership lies between the extremes, and the vast majority of the owners of the more than 310,000,000 guns in America are responsible gun owners.

They are not mass shooters or single-person shooters or murderers of any kind.

They simply own guns, guns they use for sport shooting, target shooting and, more importantly, for self-defense.

And they use them responsibly.

Part of responsible gun ownership is getting the training necessary to use and carry a gun safely and well whether it is from a paid professional or just a knowledgeable gun owner.
First Missouri’s concealed carry permits and then constitutional carry made owning and carrying handguns legal for its citizens and their safety.

Having a concealed carry permit and the few hours of training it requires worked well for Diane McIntire of Conway.

McIntire quite probably saved her own life after being attacked in Illinois by a man with a butcher knife and kidnapped for a 30-45 minute car ride to the destination of his choosing. The man told her he was recently released from a mental health facility and only needed a ride despite cutting her arm badly enough with the butcher knife that she needed 24 stitches.

For the complete column, see the Weekend print edition of The Daily Record, or view the e-Editiononline.